Monday we walked around Devonport Mall and town area, then did a small shop. We have to eat fruit and vegetables we have as can’t take them on the ship.
Today is sort van and car, put heater under bed and bring out fan. ( well we hope that is how it will work ).
Pack an overnight bag, no we can’t access our car and van while sailing. We do have a sleeper as the Spirit leaves 7.30pm tonight and we should be in Melbourne 6 - 6.30am.
Some interesting facts about the Spirit of Tasmania. It carries 1,400 people, has 8 levels, and carries...

Yesterday we said our farewells to David and Ann, will miss them. Then on our way to Devonport. It was much cooler when we got here, have been getting used to the lovely warm weather we have had lately.
David and Ann drove to Dover.
Saturday, we drove to Sheffield, their claim to fame is the many Murals on the fronts and sides of the buildings.
There are also about 15 Murals in a park which have been recently painted, everyone who views them are supposed to vote on which they think is the best. Lovely to see them all.
On to Deloraine, a...

Well the trip to the Spirit of Tasmania at 5.50am went well. We must have been eager as we were first in line. However the Spirit was late so there was a lot of waiting around. We actually drove onto the ship at 8.30am. It is so different to the last time we were on the Spirit, a much improved newer one. We had booked a recliner chair each and they were very comfortable. These were at the back of the ship with windows facing out to the water. We were three rows back from the windows. I chose the one where I couldn't see the water, took 1...

Finally made it to Tasmania. Loading on to the ferry, Spitit of Tasmania was ver interesting. The pur large semi trailers on as well as trailers without the prime mover. They are loaded first and then the caravans and larger motor homes and trailers followed by cars. We were on the first level. One
Once the vehicle is parked then it's up to either a cabin or deck chair, whichever you have booked. We had a cabin which was very comfortable. Quite a few bars around and a coup,e of cafe type dining areas. We turned in reasonably early. Felt the...

FOBTs,
On my way from Cradle Mountain back to Hobart I decided to take a detour to the town of Devonport, which is at the upper part of Tasmania, sort of in the middle portion of the island. The town is where the ferry from southern Australia docks in Tasmania, and it seems to be a nice unpretentious small town. I would guess the population is about 20-30K. I unexpectedly ran across a museum of the Tasmanian Railroad on the edge of town. You'll see pictures of an old steam engine locomotive, some rail cars and other engines, and a...

A very important part of our preparation to leave Port Arthur was deciding where we would go next. We only had five days left to explore Tasmania, two of which would be required for travel – one from Port Arthur to wherever-next and one from wherever-the-last-day to Devonport to catch the ferry. Three days ain’t enough, but that’s all there are!
We decided to follow up along the eastern coast to the Freycinet Peninsula and Freycinet National Park. On the way, we made an overnight stop at the really small town of Buckland. Just across the...

We left Melbourne early in the morning on the Spirit of Tasmania II having spent the night in a nearby campground. We will explore that city more thoroughly upon our return in three weeks.
It is a ten-hour journey from Melbourne across Bass Strait to Devonport, Tasmania. The trip began quite uneventfully; then we discovered a television set carrying the NFC Conference Championship game between the Seattle SeaHawks and the Green Bay Packers. We unabashedly cheered for the Hawks and were thrilled when they won. We are now faced with the...

Left St Helens this morning for the drive back down to Launceston and across to Devenport. The drive was through dairy country - a lot like the Atherton Tablelands except the roads were narrower and more windy. We stopped off at P...... at a dairy farm after a quick trip to see the Pub in the Paddock. Mary did some cheese tasting here. Back on the main road and next stop was the old tin mining town of Derby. Not much here anymore - was one the biggest supplier of tin in the world. Went to the Tin museum with an interesting story of how the...

Early start - 6am to get to the Ferry by 6:30. Easy to find from the caravan park. Quarantine inspection before waiting until 7:30 am to board. Spent the day lounging around, playing arcade games, watching movies in the theatre and eating quite expensive food. The weather was perfect and the ocean was very calm. Arrived in Devonport at 7pm and another quarantine inspection before arriving at the caravan park at 7:30 in daylight. Sun doesn't go down until 9:30!

Last night I ran out of coins before our clothes finished drying, so I had to go get change at the office this am and finish drying before I could finish packing. But we got away with clean clothes and another journal page on-line.
Both mornings we heard a “tap, tap, tap”, but there was no one at the door. Turns out it was a gray bird tapping on our bedroom window. This morning he was very persistent. Larry thinks it was expecting to be fed, and I think maybe it saw its reflection. The truth is that it was expecting its reflection to feed...

Wanted to do some prospecting again this time at the Mortlock and Ford Rivers and also down to Moina but the areas we wanted to get into are now privately owned and we could not access them so we took a drive home the long way around. Discovered a pick your own berry farm just around the corner of the park. That was great fun, what we couldn’t fit into our mouths went into the tray to purchase. When we had our fill of strawberrys, blackberrys and raspberrys, we paid for the tray and munched on them for the rest of the week. Yum. Last day in...

(Ben)
Well, for the two nights we've spent in Devonport we'd struggle to tell you much about the place. We didn't intend to be here two nights but Pip has been quite sick so we figured we'd leave off the driving for a couple of days.
We found a cheap place to set up - really just the car park at one of the local boat ramps, but legal and reasonable. Winding Old Bess up we heard a nasty twang and saw one of the corners of the roof drop and knew there was trouble - it seemed like the repairs I'd done on that corner before we left home had...